Swift Transportation and their Lease Purchase Plan

Otterhalf, no need to be completely mean I have seen my l/o with and without a APU solo and teams, good and bad weeks, you net about 100-200 more than a company driver on average, but the bad weeks? They hurt. No need to be completely discouraging. Its possable, many have, and do make it as l/o's.

 

Higher fuel surcharge.

 

First thing I tell my student, even before getting on my truck....is we take a shower (not 'together' obviously) every other day....AT WORST. I tell them, "Look, we may get along great, but I don't want to smell you....and I KNOW you won't want to smell me." And if you end up having a problem with taking a shower, laundry and brush your teeth everyday, then I've got no business having that student on my truck. I dust 3x a week, dirt devil the floor too. It is my home away from home, so why not treat it like so? I dont like to drive around in a truck that looks like I have not washed it since 1986, and don't want to have to navigate over bags of trash, etc.

 

My brother-in-law went out with a Swift mentor who didn't take a shower or brush his teeth once during the six weeks. That must have been nasty.

What some of you may not know is team driving. How often do you get to choose between a shower and 15 minutes of sleep while the truck is parked? If you're solo and you have to park every night anyway, there isn't any excuse not to shower, but we don't normally park. We are driving to make money, not to socialize, not to play video games in a truck stop or watch the tele in a terminal.

There have been times when I have turned down a shower so that I could sleep for 15 more minutes. Someone who has not driven in a 6-7k/week team operation might not understand that.

 

If you can't sleep while the truck is moving, you have no business teaming.

My mentor and I ran hard after that first week. 4 out of the 5 remaining weeks, we ran over 6K/week. That's still less than an average 500 miles per person, per day. Granted, the bulk of what we did was drop/hook. That said, though, the truck was parked no less than 3 hours every day. We did not go without showers more than 2 days the entire time. For those few days in between, we would freshen up with baby wipes.

I agree with you on many things, Ms. Morella. But on this one, I firmly do not. I found it easier to stay cleaned up on a team truck than solo. Scheduling is much more exact on a solo truck. If you choose the wrong time or place to start, fuel, take a break or sleep, it messes up the entire schedule and there isn't another team member to help catch it up. Trip planning, especially on tight loads, is essential on a solo truck.

Most mentor trucks are run as a driver-and-a-half. Loads are set up so training can actually happen. Mine was kind of an anomally (what part of my career isn't) in that I came into the business with an understanding of how to handle large vehicles. All I needed was some fine tuning and paperwork training. My mentor told his DM run us...and she did. But we never had trouble staying clean.

Luckily, Bouna was very fastidious about it. And he never peed in the truck...although the tires were watered on occasion.

 

and if you can't sleep with the truck at idle, you've got no business driving a truck. (not YOU, Injun..just 'you' in general)

 

Who said they can't?
And if your smart, your truck rarely idles.

 

Every two days is good, for a shower, if you're not doing loading, or sweating in the summertime. Sometimes we have to go three days. I'm not going to turn down a load just so that I can get a shower.

Ms. Injun, if the only team driving you have done was during your training, it doesn't seem to me that you're in a position to be preaching on the subject.

 

I over simplified for the sake of not writing a book. Thanks for the valuable information though.

 

yeah, i try not to, but when its -10 WITHOUT windchill, ya kinda have to.